The Barcode

Ten billion or more times each day, electronic scanners read data encoded in black-and-white codes-barcodes-printed on or affixed to physical goods. The Barcode is the memoir from the team who helped create the barcode.

"The Barcode is a celebration of the digital age and the entrepreneurial spirit ... and of the men and women who had the vision, the courage and the fortitude to take an 'impossible' idea and make it real. The Barcode tells the real story of the team at IBM that developed the technology we use today, why it was selected in layman's terms, and in the appendix, why it is superior for the technical community. In its contribution to both global economic prosperity and the quality of daily life few ... technologies ... equal the barcode. But who knows the history of the barcode? No one is better suited to tell the story than Paul McEnroe. In so many ways, the story of the barcode is his story.

Barcode scans are so common, so ubiquitous, that we scarcely notice them. They permeate every corner of our lives. They can be found on Mars rovers and ocean bottoms ... on children's toys and giant earthmoving equipment. You are likely wearing some at this very moment without really knowing how they happened or who created them. A truly successful technology becomes invisible. And then, even if you encounter it dozens of times each day, as you do with barcodes, it becomes forgotten."

-From the Foreword by Michael S. Malone